Career Hub

The Boss is Always Right

A sales rep, an administration clerk, and the manager are walking to lunch when they find an antique oil lamp. They rub it and a Genie comes out. The Genie says, 'I'll give each of you just one wish.' 'Me first! Me first!' says the admin clerk 'I want to be in the Bahamas, driving a speedboat, without a care in the world.' Puff! She's gone.

'Me next! Me next!' says the sales rep. 'I want to be in Hawaii, relaxing on the beach with my personal masseuse, an endless supply of Pina Coladas and the love of my life.' Puff! He's gone. 'OK, you're up,' the Genie says to the manager. The manager says, 'I want those two back in the office after lunch'

Moral of the story: Always let your boss have the first say.

Choose Your Own Adventure

Interested in exploring new opportunities but feeling guilty due to employment declines from Wall Street to Main Street? Do you dare disturb the universe by imagining what could be—if only you knew what it was? Are you wondering if the sky is falling—and if your employment prospects are tumbling after?

Pull yourself out of a “Chicken Little” moment with Alexandra Levit’s book How Did You Score That Gig? This slim tome of wisdom provides you with a slick strategy to choose your own adventure—as well as practical advice from others who have done it before.

Don’t have time for reading an entire book? Take the quiz at the beginning of the book and you’ll land in one of seven personality categories: are you an adventurer, a creator, a data head, an entrepreneur, an investigator, a networker, or a nurturer?

Flip to the category that suits you best and read up on the positions that may align with your personality style; Ms. Levit presents 60 “hot jobs” determined by an online survey of 20’s and 30's somethings. From actor and fashion designer (“creator”) to art curator and criminologist (“investigator”), she profiles successful executives in each category, and presents career trajectories and tips for breaking into the field.

Restless or determining a non-fit? Move onto another section and explore the alternatives.

Whether you’re looking for a new opportunity and not sure what you’d like to do, or if you’ve identified where you want to go but don’t know how to get there—this is a great way to jump-start your search. Packed with resources, career tips and insider insights, it’s easy to use. (So simple, in fact, that I recommend this format to the folks over at the Department of Labor who produce the Occupational Outlook Handbook--they'd be well advised to take a lead from Ms. Leavit in the next biennial redesign.)

For more information, check out How Did You Score That Gig? and the author’s Water Cooler Wisdom blog.

By Chandlee Bryan, Cross Posted at the Emerging Professional.

Are you starting to feel the heat in your job?

When you have an 'I Hate My Job day'

(Even if you're retired, you sometimes have those days)
Try this out:
On your way home from work, stop at your pharmacy and go to the thermometer section and purchase a rectal thermometer made by Johnson & Johnson

Be very sure you get this brand. When you get home, lock your doors, draw the curtains and disconnect the phone so you will not be disturbed.

Change into very comfortable clothing and sit in your favorite chair. Open the package and remove the thermometer. Now, carefully place it on a table or a surface so that it will not become chipped or broken.

Now the fun part begins.

Take out the literature from the box and read it carefully. You will notice that in small print there is a statement:

'Every Rectal Thermometer made by Johnson &Johnson is personally tested. ' and then sanitized

Now, close your eyes and repeat out loud five times,'I am so glad I do not work in the thermometer quality control department at Johnson & Johnson.'

HAVE A NICE DAY; AND REMEMBER, THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE ELSE WITH A JOB THAT IS MORE OF A PAIN IN THE ASS THAN YOURS!

.........Remember, if you haven't got a smile on your face and laughter in your heart...Then maybe you should go and work for Johnson & Johnson!!!!!

Ouch!

OK, I know it's wrong to laugh at others' misfortune but this just made me giggle:

“One of my employees created a MySpace page,” says Wilson Solovic. “He also set me up with one. Over the holiday break I knew he was going to propose to his girlfriend. So I went on his page to see if he had blogged about it. Sure enough, he had a blog entry titled ‘She Said Yes.’ So while I was there I decided to read a few more entries. That’s when I found one talking about his ‘chicken s____’ bosses and how he hates his job and so on and so forth. I was livid.

I know many young workers struggle to separate private life from business online, but was it really hard for this kid to figure out that if he got his boss on MySpace, he should probably watch what he said? Seesh!

Congratulations on your new job - NOT!

Just came across a new branding blog Dim Bulb by Jonathan Salem Baskin, author of Branding Only Works on Cattle and saw this post today - a memo to Mark Snyder the new VP- Chief Marketing Officer at K-Mart congratulating him on his new job.

Whilst humorous (and biting) it still makes some very important points about the changing landscape for branding - and made me think equally about how that impacts personal branding and managing your career.

• Focus - it's no longer about touchpoints, get out there and find where the hiring managers form, make and actually hire - forget the traditional apporaches to finding a job
• Living - find organizations where everyone is really living the culture and values that are a fit for you, not just paying lip service to some mission statement that means nothing and they have not had a say in creating and developing
• Influencing - working for organizations where that brand extends beyond its own walls (virtual or otherwise) and makes a difference to all that it touches - suppliers, customers, community.

Make sense?

Why Won't They Hire Me?

When I'm procrastinating on a tough project, I start surfing the web. Usually I waste too much time on sites that I can't even remember. But today I came across Not Hired.

I'm still laughing. Check it out - but wait until you have a few minutes spare because once you start clicking, you won't be able to stop.

 

Your Boss: Naughty or Nice?

I have a couple of clients who play Santa during the holiday season and you know Santa Claus...gonna find out who's naughty or nice. Speaking of naughty or nice, Asher Adelman over at eBossWatch and JerkFreeJobs recently launched a Boss Contest site.

The eBossWatch Boss Contest is an opportunity for people to share their stories about working with toxic bosses, as well as with excellent bosses. Visitors can post comments. Story winners for either Best Boss of the Month or The Toxic Boss of the Month will be announced at the end of the month. Winners will receive a copy of Bullying Bosses: A Survivor's Guide or The Power of Nice: How to Conquer the Business World with Kindness.

So, has your boss been naughty or nice?

posted by: billiesucher

Take the Presidential Candidate Logo Quiz

Check out the websites of the candidates for president. Branding is evident in taglines, site look-and-feel, and content, but also in logos. If the candidates for president believe that using logos will help them get them a job, why not the rest of us?

NPR's Day To Day had a segment about presidential candidate logos yesterday and what they say about the individual. Take the brand quiz: match the message (as I read it) with the candidate logo at the bottom of this post.

"American symbol of soaring"
"Strong in crisis and BOLD"
"Solid experienced American"
"Hope"
"Military experience"
"Into the future"

Do some of these logos communicate a distinctive message better than others? What does all this mean for you and me? Do we put a logo in our email signatures? How about on our websites, blogs and portfolios? How do we make our logo truly distinctive to powerfully transmit our brand? I know I'll be thinking about: Our Logos, Our Selves.

Making A List, Checking It Twice

It's that time of year again -- the holiday season -- where you may find yourself in the midst of making lists, shopping, wrapping, entertaining, cooking, traveling and oh, did I mention trying to do your day job?

If you celebrate the holidays and participate in gift-gifting, perhaps you're wondering what to give your friend or loved one who's looking for a new employment opportunity? Consider these ideas and maybe one of them will be just the thing for that special person in your life:

1. A good career-related book

2. Career Hub eBooks (download them for free; they're good, too!)

3. Gift card for coffee

4. Postage Stamps

5. Personalized (or plain) Thank You cards

6. Resume kit (paper, envelopes)

7. Dry-cleaning gift certificate

8. Massage gift certificate

9. Manicure

10. Hair Salon / barber-stylist gift certificate

11. Box of chocolates

12. Bookstore gift card

13. Gift certificate for career coaching, resume writing, interview training (visit Career Management Alliance for career professionals  in your area)

14. Calling card (especially if your friend/family member's former employer kept the cell phone)

15. Movie tickets

16. Gasoline gift card

17. Gift certificate for two to your favorite restaurant

18. Business cards gift certificate

19. Paul Potts CD - beautiful music (and inspirational career story)

20. Gift certificate to local tailor

21. Sticky notes (plain or personalized)

22. A good pen

23. A diary / journal

Have fun shopping; delight in the giving!

posted by: billiesucher

Did Someone Not Come in to Work Today?

Chances are that if someone is not coming in this week today is the more likely day. According to a recent CareerBuilder.com survey Monday is the most popular day for calling in sick and 32% of adults called in last year even tohugh they were not ill enough to miss a day.

When asked to share the most unusual excuses employees gave for missing work, employers offered the following real-life examples:

• Employee said he was crabby


• Employee got whiplash from brushing her hair


• Employee said her psychic told her to stay home or something awful would happen to her


• Employee said he wasn't feeling well and wanted to rest up for the company's holiday party that night


• Employee said her chickens' feet were frozen to the driveway


• At her sister's wedding, the employee chipped her tooth on a mint julep, bent over to spit it out, hit her head on a keg and was knocked unconscious with a mild concussion


• Employee claimed to have met a movie star and was spending the day with him


• Employee was injured while getting a haircut


• Employee tasted some dog food because the dog was not feeling well and now the employee is sick


• Employee's roommate locked all his clothes in a shed for spite


• A groundhog bit the employee's car tire, causing it to go flat


• Employee had been up all night because their favorite "American Idol" contestant was voted off